User:Orser67/Lincoln

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This article is part of a series about Abraham Lincoln
Personal Early life and career Family Health Sexuality Political Political career, 1849–1861 Lincoln–Douglas debates Cooper Union speech Farewell address Views on slavery Views on religion Electoral history 16th President of the United States Presidency First term Transition 1st inauguration Address Hannibal Hamlin American Civil War The Union Emancipation Proclamation Ten percent plan Gettysburg Address 13th Amendment Second term 2nd inauguration Address Andrew Johnson Reconstruction Presidential elections 1860 Convention 1864 Convention Assassination and legacy Assassination Funeral Historical reputation Memorials Depictions Bibliography Topical guide
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The presidency of Abraham Lincoln began on March 4, 1861, when he was

Lincoln, a former

On election day, Lincoln carried all but one Northern state to win an

Threat of secession

Following Lincoln's victory, several Southern states discussed the possibility of secession. Lincoln was not scheduled to take office until March 1861, leaving incumbent Democratic President James Buchanan, widely viewed as a "doughface," to preside over the country until that time.^[10] President Buchanan declared that secession was illegal while denying that the government had any power to resist it, and Lincoln with no official ability to act while the secession crisis deepened.^[11] Nonetheless, Lincoln was barraged with questions and comments from people across the nation about events in the South. Many expected Lincoln to somehow provide reassurances to the South that their interests were not being threatened.^[12] Realizing that soothing words on the rights of slaveholders would alienate the Republican base, while taking a strong stand on the indestructibility of the Union could further inflame Southerners, Lincoln chose a policy of silence. He believed that, given enough time without any overt acts or threats to the South, Southern unionists would carry the day and bring their states back into the Union.^[13] At the suggestion of a Southern merchant who contacted him, Lincoln did make an indirect appeal to the South by providing material for his friend Senator Lyman Trumbull to insert into his own public address. Republicans praised the address, Democrats assailed it, and the South largely ignored it.^[14]

In December 1860, both the House and Senate formed special committees to address the unfolding crisis. Lincoln communicated with various Congressmen that there was room for negotiation on issues such as fugitive slaves, slavery in the District of Columbia, and the domestic slave trade. However he made it clear that he was unalterably opposed to anything which would allow the expansion of slavery into any new states or territories.^[15] On December 6, Lincoln wrote to Congressman Kellogg, on the House committee, that he should: "entertain no proposition for a compromise in regard to the extension of slavery. The instant you do, they have us under again; all our labor is lost, and sooner or later must be done over. Douglas is sure to be again trying to bring in his [popular sovereignty]. Have none of it. The tug has to come & better now than later."^[16]

In mid-December, Senator John J. Crittenden of Kentucky, the chairman of the Senate committee, proposed a package of six constitutional amendments, known as the Crittenden Compromise. The compromise would protect slavery in federal territories south of the 36°30′ parallel and prohibit it in territories north of that latitude, with newly admitted states deciding on the status of slavery within their borders. Congress would be forbidden from abolishing slavery in any state (or the District of Columbia) or interfering with the domestic slave trade. When Seward and Weed tried to pressure Lincoln into supporting the compromise, he resisted.^[17] Still resistant to the expansion of slavery into the territories, Lincoln privately asked Republican Senators to oppose the compromise, and it failed to pass Congress.^[18]

Deepening crisis

Lincoln believed that Southern threats of secession were mostly bluster and that the sectional crisis would be defused, as it had in 1820 and 1850. But Southerners were outraged by the election of the anti-slavery Lincoln, who they viewed as a sectional candidate. On December 20, 1860,

In February 1861, two final political efforts were made to preserve the Union. The first was made by a group of 131 delegates (including: six former cabinet members; 19 ex-governors; 14 former senators; 50 former representatives; 12 state supreme court justices; and one former president, John Tyler, who presided) sent by 21 states to a Peace Conference, held at the Willard's Hotel in the nation's capital.^[20] The convention adopted, and submitted to Congress, a seven-point constitutional amendment proposal similar in content to the earlier Crittenden Compromise. The proposal was rejected by the Senate and never considered by the House.^[21][22] The second effort was a "never-never" constitutional amendment on slavery, that would shield domestic institutions of the states from Congressional interference and from future constitutional amendments. Commonly known as the Corwin Amendment, the measure was approved by Congress and sent to the state legislatures for ratification.^[21] While only ratified by a few states, Congress did not set a time limit for its ratification, thus the amendment is still technically pending.^[23][24]

Arrival in Washington, D.C.

On February 11, 1861, Lincoln boarded a special train that over the course of the next two weeks would take him to the nation's capital.^[25] Lincoln spoke several times each day during the train trip. While his speeches were mostly extemporaneous, his message was consistent: he had no hostile intentions towards the South, disunion was not acceptable, and he intended to enforce the laws and protect property.^[26]

Rumors abounded during the course of the trip of various plots to kill Lincoln.

Lincoln, aware that his inaugural address would be delivered in an atmosphere filled with fear and anxiety, and amid an unstable political landscape, sought guidance from colleagues and friends as he prepared it. Among those whose counsel Lincoln sought was Orville Browning, who advised Lincoln to omit the overly aggressive phrase "to reclaim the public property and places which have fallen". He also asked his former rival (and Secretary of State-designate) William Seward to review it. Seward exercised his due diligence by presenting Lincoln with a six-page analysis of the speech in which he offered some 49 suggested changes; of which the president-elect incorporated 27 into the final draft.^[30]

Lincoln's first presidential inauguration occurred on March 4, 1861 on the East Portico of the

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battle-field, and patriot grave, to every living heart and hearth-stone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.[37]

Administration

Cabinet

William Seward (left) and Gideon Wells (right) served in Lincoln's cabinet throughout his presidency.

Lincoln began the process of constructing his cabinet on election night.^[39] As he did, Lincoln attempted to reach out to every faction of his party with a special emphasis on balancing anti-slavery former Whigs with former free-soil Democrats, in an effort to create a cabinet that would unite the Republican Party.^[40] Lincoln's eventual cabinet would include all of his main rivals for the Republican nomination. He did not shy away from surrounding himself with strong-minded men, even those whose credentials for office appeared to be much more impressive than his own.^[41] In late November, he met with Vice President-elect Hamlin, Senator Trumbull, and Donn Piatt, an Ohio editor and politician, to discuss cabinet selections.^[42]

The first cabinet position filled was that of Secretary of State. It was tradition for the president-elect to offer this, the most senior cabinet post, to the leading (best-known and most popular) person of his political party. William Seward, was that man and in mid-December 1860, Hamlin, acting on Lincoln's behalf, offered the position to him. He was slow to formally accept, doing so two weeks later.^[43] He would remain as Secretary of State throughout Lincoln's presidency and continue in that position after Lincoln's death.^[44]

Lincoln's choice for Secretary of the Treasury was Ohio Senator Salmon P. Chase, Seward's chief political rival.^[45] Seward, among others, opposed the selection of Chase because of both his strong antislavery record and his opposition to any type of settlement with the South that could be considered appeasement for slaveholders. They would lobby against Chase right up to Lincoln's inauguration.^[46] Chase would repeatedly threaten to resign to serve his own ends and finally Lincoln surprised him by accepting in 1864.^[47] He would be replaced by William P. Fessenden. When he reluctantly took office, the economy was in dire straits. After a remarkable turn-around, Fesserden resigned only eight months later.^[48] He was in turn replaced by Hugh McCulloch.^[48]

The most problematic selection made by Lincoln was that of

Lincoln had discussed with Weed the possibility of nominating a Southerner to the cabinet.[43] In December 1860, he meet with Edward Bates of Missouri. Bates, a former conservative Whig, had been one of Lincoln's rivals for the presidential nomination. He accepted Lincoln's offer of Attorney General. Bates said that he had declined a similar offer from Millard Fillmore in 1850, but the gravity of present events mandated that he accept.^[54] Bates would resign in 1864 after several disagreements with Lincoln, culminating in his resentment at not being nominated to the Supreme Court.^[55] He was replaced by James Speed, the older brother of Lincoln's close friend, Joshua Fry Speed.^[56]

Lincoln proposed

BEP engraved portrait of Salmon P. Chase, sixth Chief Justice of the United States, 1864 – 1873

Lincoln's declared philosophy on court nominations was that "we cannot ask a man what he will do, and if we should, and he should answer us, we should despise him for it. Therefore we must take a man whose opinions are known."

• Noah Haynes Swayne – Associate Justice (to replace John McLean),
      nominated January 21, 1862 and confirmed by the Senate January 24, 1862
• Peter Vivian Daniel
  ),
      nominated July 16, 1862 and confirmed by the Senate the same day
• David Davis – Associate Justice (to replace John Archibald Campbell),
      nominated December 1, 1862 and confirmed by the Senate December 8, 1862
• Stephen Johnson Field – Associate Justice (to a newly-created seat),
      nominated March 6, 1863 and confirmed by the Senate March 10, 1863
• Roger Taney
  ),
      nominated December 6, 1864 and confirmed by the Senate the same day

Lincoln also appointed 27 judges to the

Among the federal agencies established or that began operations during Lincoln's presidency were:

• United States Government Publishing Office (June 23, 1860; 12 Stat. 117)
• Department of Agriculture (May 15, 1862; 12 Stat. 387)
• Commissioner of Internal Revenue (July 1, 1862; 12 Stat. 432)
• Bureau of Engraving and Printing (July 11, 1862; 12 Stat. 532)
• Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (February 25, 1863; 12 Stat. 665)
• Freedmen's Bureau (March 3, 1865; 13 Stat. 507)

American Civil War

Attack on Fort Sumter

Background

Shortly before the November election, the general-in-chief of the army, Winfield Scott, had prepared a memorandum for President Buchanan (which was subsequently shared with Lincoln) in which he warned that there was a danger of "the seizure of a number of federal forts on the Mississippi River and on the Eastern coast, including the vulnerable installations at Charleston harbor". Scott recommended that "all those works should be immediately so garrisoned as to make any attempt to take any one of them by surprise or coup de main ridiculous".^[69] Buchanan dismissed Scott's suggestions as provocative to the South.^[70]

The day before Lincoln's inauguration, Scott wrote to Seward to suggest that Fort Sumter be abandoned. Scott saw four options for the administration—a full-scale military operation to subdue the South, endorsement of the Crittenden Compromise to win back the seceded states, the closure of Southern ports and the collection of duties from ships stationed outside the harbors, or directing the seven Southern states that had declared secession to "depart in peace".^[71]

Decision to relieve the fort

Lincoln concentrated on the most immediate question of whether to maintain or abandon Fort Sumter, which was located near Charleston. By the time Lincoln assumed office seven states had declared their secession and had seized all federal property within their bounds, except for Fort Sumter, Fort Pickens near Pensacola, and two small forts in the Florida Keys. Any hope Lincoln might have had about using time to his advantage in addressing the crisis was shattered on his first full day in office, when he read a letter from Major Robert Anderson, the commander at Fort Sumter, stating that his troops would run out of provisions within four to six weeks.^[72]

At a meeting on March 7, Scott and

The Fox proposal was discussed at a cabinet meeting, and Lincoln followed up on March 15 by asking each cabinet member to provide a written answer to the question, "Assuming it to be possible to now provision Fort-Sumpter [sic], under all circumstances, is it wise to attempt it?" Only Blair gave his unconditional approval to the plan. No decision was reached, although Lincoln told at least one congressman that if he were forced to surrender Sumter, holding Fort Pickens would still make a symbolic point. In the meantime Lincoln personally dispatched Fox to Charleston to talk to Anderson and independently assess the situation. Lincoln also sent Illinois friends Stephen A. Hurlbut and Ward Lamon to the city on a separate intelligence-gathering mission. The recommendations that came back were that reinforcement was both necessary, since secessionist feeling ran high and threatened the fort, and feasible, despite Anderson's misgivings.^[75]

On March 28, however, Scott recommended that both Pickens and Sumter be abandoned, basing his decision more on political than military grounds. The next day a deeply agitated Lincoln presented Scott's proposal to the cabinet. Blair was now joined by Welles and Chase in supporting reinforcement. Bates was non-committal, Cameron was not in attendance, and Seward and Smith opposed resupply. Later that day Lincoln gave Fox the order to begin assembling a squadron to reinforce Fort Sumter.^[76]

Surrender of the fort

The actual dispatch of the squadron was complicated by the failure of Lincoln, Welles, Seward, and the men on the ground preparing the expedition to communicate effectively. Assets needed for the Fort Sumter expedition were mistakenly directed to a separate mission to Fort Pickens.

I am directed by the President of the United States to notify you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort-Sumpter [sic] with provisions only; and that, if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or ammunition, will be made, without further notice, or in case of an attack upon the Fort.^[78]

The message was delivered to Pickens on April 8.^[79] The information was telegraphed that night to Confederate President Jefferson Davis in Richmond. The Confederate cabinet was already meeting to discuss the Sumter crisis, and on April 10 Davis decided to demand the surrender of the fort and bombard it if the demand was refused.^[80] An attack on the fort was initiated on April 12, and the fort surrendered the next day. The relief expedition sent by the Union arrived too late to intervene.^[81] The attack on Fort Sumter marked the start of the American Civil War.

Early war

Shortly after the fall of Fort Sumter, Lincoln issued a proclamation calling up a force of seventy-five thousand state militiamen to serve three-month terms. While Northern states rallied to the request, border states such as Missouri refused to provide soldiers. Lincoln called Congress into a special session to begin in July. Though an in-session Congress could potentially affect his freedom of action, Lincoln needed Congress to authorize funds to fight the war against the Confederacy. On the advice of Winfield Scott, Lincoln asked a political ally to offer General Robert E. Lee command of the Union forces, but Lee ultimately chose to serve the Confederacy. Union soldiers in Southern states burned federal facilities to prevent Southern forces from taking control of them, while Confederate sympathizers led a riot in Baltimore. To ensure the security of the capital, Lincoln suspended habeas corpus in Maryland, and ignored a court order ordering him to release a detained prisoner. While Lincoln struggled to maintain order in Maryland and other border states, Virginia, North Carolina, Arkansas, and Tennessee all seceded from the Union. North Carolina was the last state to secede, doing so on May 20.^[82]

With the secession of several states, Lincoln's Republicans enjoyed large majorities in both houses of Congress. Additionally,

Following the secession of four states after the Battle of Fort Sumter, Lincoln became concerned that the slave-holding border states of Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri would join the Confederacy. Of these four states, Lincoln was least concerned about Delaware, which had a proportionally large pro-Union population. Due to its location, Maryland remained a critical part of the Union. Lincoln continued to suppress Southern sympathizers in the state, but historian Ronald White also notes Lincoln's forbearance in refusing to take harsher measures. Maryland's election of Unionist Governor Augustus Bradford in November 1861 ensured that Maryland would remain part of the Union. Perhaps even more critical than Maryland was Kentucky, which provided access to key rivers and served as a gateway to Tennessee and the Midwest. Hoping to avoid upsetting the delicate balance in the state, Lincoln publicly ordered military leaders to respect Kentucky's declared neutrality, but quietly provided support to Kentucky Unionists. The Confederates were the first to violate this neutrality, seizing control of the town of Columbus, while the Union would capture the important town of Paducah. Like Kentucky, Missouri controlled access to key rivers and had a large pro-Confederate population. Lincoln appointed General John C. Frémont to ensure Union control of the area, but Frémont alienated many in the state by declaring martial law and issuing a proclamation freeing slaves that belonged to rebels. Lincoln removed Frémont and reversed the order, but Missouri emerged as the most problematic of the border states for Lincoln.^[89]

Eastern Theater to 1864

1861 and the Peninsula Campaign

After the defeat at the First Battle of Bull Run, Lincoln summoned Major General

In January 1862, Lincoln, frustrated by months of inaction, ordered McClellan to begin the offensive by the end of February.^[94] When McClellan still failed to to launch his attack, members of Congress urged Lincoln to replace McClellan with McDowell or Frémont, but Lincoln decided to retain McClellan as commander of Army of the Potomac over two generals who he felt had already failed. He did, however, remove McClellan as general-in-chief of the army in May, leaving the office vacant. McClellan moved against Confederate forces in March. The Army of Potomac fought the bloody-but-inconclusive Battle of Seven Pines at the end of May. Following the battle, Robert E. Lee took command of Confederate forces in Virginia, and he led his forces to victory in the Seven Days Battles. The Confederate victory effectively ended the Peninsula Campaign.^[95]

Second Bull Run, Antietam, and Fredericksburg

In late June, while the Army of the Potomac was fighting the Seven Days Battles, Lincoln appointed

Two days after McClellan's return to command, General Lee's forces crossed the Potomac River into Maryland, leading to the Battle of Antietam in September 1862.^[98] The ensuing Union victory was among the bloodiest in American history, but it enabled Lincoln to announce that he would issue an Emancipation Proclamation in January.^[99] Following the battle, McClellan resisted the president's demand that he pursue Lee's retreating and exposed army.^[100] After the 1862 mid-term elections, Lincoln, frustrated with McClellan's continued inactivity, replaced McClellan with Burnside.^[101]

Against the advice of the president, Burnside prematurely launched an offensive across the

Following the Battle of Fredericksburg, Lincoln at first kept Burnside in command, but reassigned the general to Western theater in January 1863 after the

The Confederate and Union armies met at the Battle of Gettysburg on July 1. The battle, fought over three days, resulted in the highest number of casualties in the war. Along with the Union victory in the Siege of Vicksburg, the Battle of Gettysburg is often referred to as a turning point in the war. Though the battle ended with a Confederate retreat, Lincoln was dismayed that Meade had failed to destroy Lee's army. Feeling that Meade was a competent commander despite his failure to pursue Lee, and Lincoln allowed Meade to remain in command of the Army of the Potomac.^[108] The Eastern Theater would be locked in a stalemate for the remainder of 1863.

In November 1863, Lincoln was invited to Gettysburg to dedicate the first national cemetery and honor the soldiers who had fallen. His Gettysburg Address became a core statement of American political values. Defying Lincoln's prediction that "the world will little note, nor long remember what we say here", the Address became the most quoted speech in American history.

Compared to the Eastern Theater of the war, Lincoln exercised less direct control over operations that took place West of the

In April 1861, Lincoln announced the Union blockade of all Southern ports; commercial ships could not get insurance and regular traffic ended. The South blundered in embargoing cotton exports in 1861 before the blockade was effective; by the time they realized the mistake, it was too late. "King Cotton" was dead, as the South could export less than 10 percent of its cotton. The blockade shut down the ten Confederate seaports with railheads that moved almost all the cotton, especially New Orleans, Mobile, and Charleston. By June 1861, warships were stationed off the principal Southern ports, and a year later nearly 300 ships were in service.^[121] Surdam argues that the blockade was a powerful weapon that eventually ruined the Southern economy, at the cost of few lives in combat. Practically, the entire Confederate cotton crop was useless (although it was sold to Union traders), costing the Confederacy its main source of income. Critical imports were scarce and the coastal trade was largely ended as well.^[122] The measure of the blockade's success was not the few ships that slipped through, but the thousands that never tried it. Merchant ships owned in Europe could not get insurance and were too slow to evade the blockade; they simply stopped calling at Confederate ports.^[123]

Grant takes command

Grant was one of the few senior general that Lincoln did not know personally, and the president was not able to visit the Western Theater of the war. But Lincoln came to appreciate the battlefield exploits of Grant despite complaints from others in the army.

Two months after being promoted to general-in-chief, Grant embarked upon his bloody Overland Campaign. This is often characterized as a war of attrition, given high Union losses at battles such as the Battle of the Wilderness and Cold Harbor. Even though they had the advantage of fighting on the defensive, the Confederate forces had "almost as high a percentage of casualties as the Union forces".^[129] The high casualty figures alarmed many in the North, as Grant lost a third of his army. When Lincoln asked what Grant's plans were, the general replied, "I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer."^[130] Despite heavy losses, Lincoln continued to support Grant.^[131]

General Sherman led Union forces from Chattanooga to Atlanta, defeating Confederate Generals

As the war drew to a close, Lincoln's presidential Reconstruction for the South was in flux. Lincoln was determined to find a course of action that would reunite the nation as soon as possible and not permanently alienate the Southerners. When Lincoln went to Richmond, Virginia on April 5 to survey the fallen capital of the Confederacy for himself, he was asked by General Godfrey Weitzel how the defeated Confederates should be treated; Lincoln replied, "Let 'em up easy."^[149] Lincoln signed into law Senator Charles Sumner's Freedmen's Bureau bill that set up a temporary federal agency designed to meet the immediate material needs of former slaves. The law assigned land for a lease of three years with the ability to purchase title for the freedmen. Lincoln stated that his Louisiana plan did not apply to all states under Reconstruction. Shortly before his assassination, Lincoln announced he had a new plan for Southern Reconstruction. Discussions with his cabinet revealed Lincoln planned short-term military control over Southern states, with eventual readmission under the control of Southern Unionists.^[150] Lincoln did not take a definitive stand on black suffrage, stating only that "very intelligent blacks" and those that had served in the military should be granted the right to vote.^[151]

Historian Eric Foner notes that no one knows what Lincoln would have done about Reconstruction, and asserts that "Lincoln's ideas would undoubtedly have continued to evolve."^[152] Foner also asserts that,

Unlike Sumner and other Radicals, Lincoln did not see Reconstruction as an opportunity for a sweeping political and social revolution beyond emancipation. He had long made clear his opposition to the confiscation and redistribution of land. He believed, as most Republicans did in April 1865, that the voting requirements should be determined by the states. He assumed that political control in the South would pass to white Unionists, reluctant secessionists, and forward-looking former Confederates. But time and again during the war, Lincoln, after initial opposition, and come to embrace positions first advanced by abolitionists and Radical Republicans..... Lincoln undoubtedly would have listened carefully to the outcry for further protection for the former slaves.... It is entirely plausible to imagine Lincoln and Congress agreeing on a Reconstruction policy that encompassed federal protection for basic civil rights plus limited black suffrage, along the lines Lincoln proposed just before his death." ^[152]

Ending Slavery

I would save the Union. I would save it the shortest way under the Constitution. The sooner the national authority can be restored; the nearer the Union will be "the Union as it was". ... My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that.[155]

As the Civil War continued, freeing the slaves became an important wartime measure for weakening the rebellion by destroying the economic base of its leadership class. On August 6, 1861, Lincoln signed the Confiscation Act of 1861, which authorized court proceedings to confiscate the slaves of anyone who participated in or aided the Confederate war effort. The act however, did not specify whether the slaves were free.^[156] In April 1862, Lincoln signed a law abolishing slavery in Washington, D.C., and, in June, he signed another law abolishing slavery in all federal territories. The following month, Lincoln signed the Confiscation Act of 1862, which declared that all Confederate slaves taking refuge behind Union lines were to be set free.^[157]

Emancipation Proclamation

The same month that Lincoln signed the Second Confiscation Act, he also privately decided that he would pursue emancipation as a war goal. On July 22, 1862, Lincoln read to his cabinet a preliminary draft of a proclamation calling for emancipation of all slaves in the Confederacy. As the Union had suffered several defeats in the early part of the war, Seward convinced Lincoln to announce this emancipation plan after a significant Union victory so that it would not seem like a move of desperation.^[158] Lincoln was forced to wait several months until the Union victory at the Battle of Antietam.^[159]

The Emancipation Proclamation, announced on September 22 and put in effect January 1, 1863, applied in the eleven states that were still in rebellion in 1863, and thus did not cover the nearly 500,000 slaves in the slave-holding border states (Missouri, Kentucky, Maryland or Delaware) which were Union states. Those slaves were freed by later separate state and federal actions. The state of Tennessee had already mostly returned to Union control, under a recognized Union government, so it was not named and was exempted. Virginia was named, but exemptions were specified for the 48 counties then in the process of forming the new state of West Virginia, as well as the seven additional counties and two cities in the Union-controlled

Lincoln became more vociferously anti-slavery as the war continued, and authorized the arming of black soldiers despite considerable resistance from many whites.^[163] In December 1863, a proposed constitutional amendment that would outlaw slavery was introduced in Congress; though the Senate voted for the amendment with the necessary two-thirds majority, the amendment did not receive sufficient support in the House.^[164] On accepting the 1864 National Union nomination, Lincoln told the party that he would seek to ratify a constitutional amendment that would abolish slavery in the United States.^[165] After winning re-election, Lincoln made ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment (as it would become known) a priority. With the aid of large majorities in both houses of Congress, Lincoln believed that the could permanently end the institution of slavery in the United States.^[166] Though he had largely avoided becoming involved in Congressional legislative processes, Lincoln gave the ratification struggle his full attention. Rather than waiting for the 39th Congress to convene in March, Lincoln pressed the lame duck session of the 38th Congress to ratify the Thirteenth Amendment as soon as possible. Lincoln and Seward engaged in an extensive lobbying campaign to win their votes. In a vote held on January 31, the House narrowly cleared the two-thirds threshold in a 119-56 vote.^[167] The Thirteenth Amendment was sent to the states for ratification, and Secretary of State Seward would proclaim its adoption on December 18, 1865.

Domestic policy

Economic policy

Lincoln adhered to the Whig understanding of

In 1862, Lincoln sent General Pope to put down the "Sioux Uprising" in Minnesota. Presented with 303 execution warrants for convicted Santee Dakota who were accused of killing innocent farmers, Lincoln conducted his own personal review of each of these warrants, eventually approving 39 for execution (one was later reprieved).^[174] In his final two annual messages to Congress Lincoln called for reform of the Bureau of Indian Affairs and federal Indian policy. However, as the war to preserve the Union was Lincoln's primary concern, he simply allowed the system to function unchanged for the balance of his presidency.^[175]

In response to rumors of a draft, the editors of the New York World and the Journal of Commerce published a false draft proclamation which created an opportunity for the editors and others employed at the publications to corner the gold market. Lincoln's reaction was to send the strongest of messages to the media about such behavior; he ordered the military to seize the two papers. The seizure lasted for two days.^[176]

Lincoln is largely responsible for the institution of the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States.^[65] Before Lincoln's presidency, Thanksgiving, while a regional holiday in New England since the 17th century, had been proclaimed by the federal government only sporadically and on irregular dates. The last such proclamation had been during James Madison's presidency 50 years before. In 1863, Lincoln declared the final Thursday in November of that year to be a day of Thanksgiving.^[65]

In June 1864, Lincoln approved the Yosemite Grant enacted by Congress, which provided unprecedented federal protection for the area now known as Yosemite National Park.^[177]

Foreign policy

Foreign nations were officially neutral throughout the American Civil War, and none recognized the Confederacy, marking a major diplomatic achievement for Secretary Seward and the Lincoln Administration. France, under Napoleon III, invaded Mexico in December 1861 and installed a puppet regime; it hoped to negate American influence. France therefore encouraged Britain in a policy of mediation suggesting that both would recognize the Confederacy.^[178] Washington repeatedly warned that meant war. The British textile industry depended on cotton from the South, but it had stocks to keep the mills operating for a year and in any case the industrialists and workers carried little weight in British politics. Knowing a war would cut off vital shipments of American food, wreak havoc on the British merchant fleet, and cause the immediate loss of Canada, Britain, with its powerful navy, refused to go along.^[179]

Lincoln's foreign policy was deficient in 1861 in terms of appealing to European public opinion. Diplomats had to explain that United States was not committed to the ending of slavery, but instead they repeated legalistic arguments about the unconstitutionality of secession. Confederate spokesman, on the other hand, were much more successful by ignoring slavery and instead focusing on their struggle for liberty, their commitment to free trade, and the essential role of cotton in the European economy. In addition, the European aristocracy (the dominant factor in every major country) was "absolutely gleeful in pronouncing the and American debacle as proof that the entire experiment in popular government had failed. European government leaders welcomed the fragmentation of the ascendant American Republic."^[180]

Though elite opinion in Britain tended to favor the Confederacy, public opinion tended to favor the United States. Large scale trade continued in both directions with the United States, with the Americans shipping grain to Britain while Britain sent manufactured items and munitions. Immigration continued into the United States. British trade with the Confederacy was limited, with a trickle of cotton going to Britain and some munitions slipped in by numerous small blockade runners. The Confederate strategy for securing independence was largely based on the hope of military intervention by Britain and France, but Confederate diplomacy proved inept. With the announcement of the Emancipation Proclamation in September 1862, the Civil War became a war against slavery that most British supported.^[181]

A serious diplomatic dispute between the U.S. and Great Britain arose late in 1861. The Union Navy intercepted a British mail ship, the Trent, on the high seas and seized two Confederate envoys en route to Europe. The incident aroused public outrage in Britain; the government of Lord Palmerston protested vehemently, while the American public cheered. Lincoln ended the crisis, known as the Trent Affair, by releasing the two diplomats, who had been seized illegally.^[182] Concerning Lincoln's negotiating techniques during the Trent affair, biographer James G. Randall has written:

His restraint, his avoidance of any outward expression of truculence, his early softening of State Department's attitude toward Britain, his deference toward Seward and Sumner, his withholding of his own paper prepared for the occasion, his readiness to arbitrate, his golden silence in addressing Congress, his shrewdness in recognizing that war must be averted, and his clear perception that a point could be clinched for America's true position at the same time that full satisfaction was given to a friendly country.^[183]

British financiers built and operated most of the blockade runners, spending hundreds of millions of pounds on them; but that was legal and not the cause of serious tension. They were staffed by sailors and officers on leave from the Royal Navy. When the U.S. Navy captured one of the fast blockade runners, it sold the ship and cargo as prize money for the American sailors, then released the crew.

A long-term issue was the British shipyard (John Laird and Sons) building two warships for the Confederacy, including the CSS Alabama,over vehement protests from the United States. The controversy was resolved after the Civil War in the form of the Alabama Claims, in which the United States finally was given $15.5 million in arbitration by an international tribunal for damages caused by British-built warships.^[184]

In the end, these instances of British involvement neither shifted the outcome of the war nor provoked the United States into declaring war against Britain. The U.S. diplomatic mission headed by Minister

The mid-term elections in 1862 brought the Republicans severe losses due to sharp disfavor with the administration over its failure to deliver a speedy end to the war, as well as rising inflation, new high taxes, rumors of corruption, the suspension of habeas corpus, the military draft law, and fears that freed slaves would undermine the labor market. The Emancipation Proclamation announced in September gained votes for the Republicans in the rural areas of New England and the upper Midwest, but it lost votes in the cities and the lower Midwest.^[186]

While Republicans were discouraged, Democrats were energized and did especially well in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and New York. The Republicans did maintain their majorities in Congress and in the major states, except New York. The Cincinnati Gazette contended that the voters were "depressed by the interminable nature of this war, as so far conducted, and by the rapid exhaustion of the national resources without progress".^[186]

Election of 1864

With Democratic gains in the mid-term elections, Lincoln felt increasing pressure to finish the war before the end of his term.

By August, Republicans across the country were experiencing feelings of extreme anxiety, fearing that Lincoln would be defeated. The outlook was so grim that Thurlow Weed told the president directly that his "re-election was an impossibility." Acknowledging this, Lincoln wrote and signed a pledge that, if he should lose the election, he would nonetheless defeat the Confederacy by an all-out military effort before turning over the White House:[191]

This morning, as for some days past, it seems exceedingly probable that this Administration will not be re-elected. Then it will be my duty to so co-operate with the President elect, as to save the Union between the election and the inauguration; as he will have secured his election on such ground that he cannot possibly save it afterwards.^[192]

Lincoln did not show the pledge to his cabinet, but asked them to sign the sealed envelope. The president also requested Frederick Douglass to develop a plan for as helping as many slaves as possible to escape from the South before his term expired.^[193][194]

Lincoln’s re-election prospects grew brighter after the Union Navy seized Mobile Bay in late August and General Sherman captured Atlanta a few weeks later.^[195] These victories relieved Republicans' defeatist anxieties, energized the Union-Republican alliance, and helped to restore popular support for the administration’s war strategy. With these victories, the underlying disarray within the Democratic Party came to the surface.^[196] The 1864 Democratic National Convention met at the end of August, nominating General George McClellan as their presidential candidate. The divided Democrats adopted a platform calling for peace with the Confederacy, but McClellan himself favored continuing the war. McClellan agonized over accepting the nomination, but after the Union victory in Atlanta, he accepted the nomination with a public letter. According to historian Ronald C. White, McClellan's letter sought to make it clear that he wanted to re-unify the U.S., but opposed the Emancipation Proclamation.^[197]

Lincoln campaigned on the themes of "No Peace Without Victory and "Union and Liberty." Press hostile to Lincoln labeled the president a tyrant or accused him of promoting miscegenation, while McClellan's opponents accused him of being a traitor. The final election results gave Lincoln a major victory, as he took 55% of the popular vote and 212 of the 233 electoral votes.^[198]

Assassination

Shortly after 10:00 p.m. on

Lincoln's body lay in state in the East Room of the White House and then in the Capitol Rotunda through April 21, when his coffin was taken to the B&O Station.^[200] Funeral services were held in Washington, D.C., and then at additional locations as the funeral train retraced, with a few alterations, Lincoln's 1,654 miles (2,662 km) 1861 journey as president-elect.^[201] He was buried at Oak Ridge Cemetery in Springfield on May 4.

Constitutional amendments

• January 31, 1865: Congress approved an amendment to the
  United States Constitution abolishing slavery in the United States and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime, and submitted it to the state legislatures for ratification.^[202]
  • Amendment was later ratified on December 6, 1865, becoming the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.^[202]

States admitted to the Union

Two new states were admitted to the Union while Lincoln was in office:

• set off from already existing states
  (Kentucky and Maine are the others).
• Nevada – October 31, 1864^[206]
  Congress approved an enabling act authorizing Nevada Territory to form a state government in March 1864; similar legislation was also approved for Colorado Territory and Nebraska Territory. Nebraska’s constitutional convention voted against statehood, while voters in Colorado rejected the proposed state constitution, so only Nevada became a state during Lincoln's presidency.^[207][208]

Historical reputation and legacy

In

The successful reunification of the states had consequences for the name of the country. The term "the United States" has historically been used, sometimes in the plural ("these United States"), and other times in the singular, without any particular grammatical consistency. The Civil War was a significant force in the eventual dominance of the singular usage by the end of the 19th century.[213] Legal historian Paul Finkelman argues that Union victory in the Civil War and the Reconstruction Amendments, which were ratified after Lincoln's death but were made possible by the Civil War, changed the nature of the Constitution. The Union victory and the subsequent Supreme Court case of Texas v. White ended debate regarding the constitutionality of secession and Nullification by the states. In addition to ending slavery, the Reconstruction Amendments enshrined Constitutional clauses promoting racial equality.^[214]

In recent years, historians such as Harry Jaffa, Herman Belz, John Diggins, Vernon Burton and Eric Foner have stressed Lincoln's redefinition of republican values. As early as the 1850s, a time when most political rhetoric focused on the sanctity of the Constitution, Lincoln redirected emphasis to the Declaration of Independence as the foundation of American political values—what he called the "sheet anchor" of republicanism.^[215] The Declaration's emphasis on freedom and equality for all, in contrast to the Constitution's tolerance of slavery, shifted the debate. As Diggins concludes regarding the highly influential Cooper Union speech of early 1860, "Lincoln presented Americans a theory of history that offers a profound contribution to the theory and destiny of republicanism itself."^[216] His position gained strength because he highlighted the moral basis of republicanism, rather than its legalisms.^[217] Nevertheless, in 1861, Lincoln justified the war in terms of legalisms (the Constitution was a contract, and for one party to get out of a contract all the other parties had to agree), and then in terms of the national duty to guarantee a republican form of government in every state.^[218] Burton (2008) argues that Lincoln's republicanism was taken up by the Freedmen as they were emancipated.^[219]

References